The French government is trying to pass a new law regarding the immigration policy which would create tighter control on “family gathering” through DNA checking and obviously registration.To make it clearer, a mother or father of a child who moves to France and cannot afford to pay for its child travel at the same time will have to -as well as his/her child- to provide some of their DNA to show that they have the same blood as a proof of their relationship.

This raises a lot of ethical problems and ask -in a country so proud of the freedom of its citizens- since when scientific and genetic matters can decide whether or not a person should be allowed to get into a territory and furthermore since when a family can be only defined by having the same blood. Isn’t a family something a bit deeper than that? Especially nowadays that the model of a nuclear family is falling apart -even in the highest authority of the French Republic- parents are more defined now by the principle of love, care and education than any sort of “bloody” proof. This law is actually getting backwards to earlier times we all thought were over…France participated as well already to conferences regarding genetic data usage specifying that it was against the constitution to use any of this sort of information against somebody as it is against the democratic principle of freedom of individuals worldwide.Finally, the constant suspicion of people trying to rip off or take advantage of the French social system or government is just something made up to increase the insecurity and hostility against foreigners (and as an immigrant, I know what I am talking about) and cannot be considered as a long term solution to fight the problems France is currently facing. It will just increase a gap already far too deep between the French citizens and other communities who have trouble to find a way to integrate themselves in the French society (check again the results of the first round of the presidential elections only 5 years ago and imagine how immigrants could have felt that day…).

That’s the reason why a petition was started by SOS Racism (France’s leading anti-racism organisation) and Charlie Hebdo (a satirical magazine) to call for the withdrawal of the disposition. The petition has been signed by nearly 230’000 people already, including politicians, scientists, journalists, artists, and people who fought nazism during WW2.